Snakes and Ladders
by Teao
Summary: Severus Snape has never stopped searching for the child that was taken from him, but he may not like what he finds. An alternative take on the beginnings of Becoming Harriet/ diverging from Hatching Robin. Warnings for self-harm and suicide.


A note for anyone who has not read either Becoming Harriet or Hatching Robin: Severus Snape had a son, Robin, with a muggle childhood friend. Though he could never bring himself to see his night with her as anything but a terrible mistake, he came to love his son.

* * *

Severus fumed at his own soft nature as he stood beneath a neatly trimmed oak at the end of a neat, orderly muggle street, waiting. How long should he wait? It was only loyalty to Lily's memory that had brought him here in the first place. Surely, Potter would not want his help? He should have confided in someone else, sent Arthur Weasley, or Lupin...

He was about to turn and go when the owl he'd sent over to Potter's window swooped down, dropping a parchment into his hand. He frowned as he looked at it; it was the same as he'd sent Potter. Had he refused the missive? But it was more crumpled. Slowly, he turned it to see the message scrawled on the back. _As soon as possible, please. Harry._

Taking his quill, spelled not to leak ink, from his pocket, he replied that he was at the end of the road. Perhaps he'd misjudged Potter. He leaned back against the bark of the tree, sure that Potter would keep him waiting. His owl returned, and he sent it Hogwarts-bound.

For all his surety that Potter would keep him waiting, and then saunter down the road in roughly an hour, he saw a figure emerge from a house in the dawn twilight only a few moments later. He squinted- was it Potter? The figure was shorter, and swathed in utterly unmanageable hair. But then, Potter was- should be- female now. Would the spell really cause hair to grow?

As the figure approached, he was reasonably certain, and when they drew close, he could see the wide green eyes and the unmistakable scar hiding beneath the bush of hair. This… this was how she'd always been meant to look. His heart gave a strange jump. She was smaller than he'd expected, but then, neither parent had been particularly tall. He hadn't anticipated such an overt physical change. He hadn't known just how thorough the spell could be. "Harriet," he breathed, barely able to stop a sob. She was here, she was Lily's daughter… she should have been his!

"I suppose so," she said hesitantly. Snape could not stop looking at her, his eyes taking in every bit of her that had been hidden from the world all these years. "We should get you some clothes that fit," he said hoarsely, then held out his arm for her to take in side-along apparition.

He thought briefly about taking her to London- after all, Diagon Alley was familiar and easy- but that would raise questions about who she was, who was with him, and why. Hogsmeade had the same issue. Perhaps Edinburgh? For some reason, though (perhaps it was the memory of Lily) he chose Manchester, the nearest major city to his childhood home. It had been years since he'd been though, and he experienced a moment of dizzying confusion when nothing looked the same.

"Where are we?" Harriet asked.

"Manchester," Severus replied, looking around to try to orient himself. Of course. Everything had changed after that muggle bomb... He began to stride down towards Market street, but the first few closed shops drew him up short. Of course. It was too early for them to be open. He stared at one for a moment before turning to glance at Harriet. "We should have breakfast first," he said decisively, as if it had been his plan all along. "It's early."

Harriet scampered along behind him. He was sure that Harry Potter wouldn't have been this amenable. He spared a glance for the girl trotting along, struggling to keep up with his long-legged stride, and his heart ached for what could, should, have been.

Finding open shops might have been hard; finding an open cafe was not. One of the greasy-spoon variety had the door propped open, the smell of coffee and frying bacon spilling out onto the street. Severus was very fond of a cooked breakfast.

A few tables were taken by builder-types, but there were more to choose from. "Hello?" Severus called, not seeing any evidence of anyone to serve.

This earned him a glare from one of the current customers, a broad man in a paint-splattered overall. "Sit wherever, I'll be with you in a second," came the broadly accented response from what Severus deduced was the kitchen. He selected what looked to be the cleanest table in the little place and sat himself down. Cautiously, Harriet sat on the chair opposite, her eyes fastened on him as if she was expecting an outburst.

He was too tired to berate her. It had been an early start. "When are you expected with the Weasleys?"

"You knew my mum," Harriet said tremulously, completely ignoring his question.

"Yes," Severus replied, just as the missing server appeared from the kitchen to set a plate overflowing with breakfast in front of the disgruntled painter. Severus heard the rumble of Harriet's stomach from across the table. "Hungry?" he asked sardonically.

She ducked her head, a pretty blush spreading across her cheeks. That was interesting. He'd never seen Potter blush. "Haven't eaten in a while," she muttered.

Hadn't eaten in a while? What did she mean? Was she in the grip of an eating disorder? His thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of the erstwhile worker by his side. "What can I get you?"

Severus looked up, ready with a sarcastic response ready for the teenager who (Severus noted with a shudder of disgust) had his lip pierced. Any unkind comment died on his lips, however, as he met eyes every bit as dark as his in a pale, pinched face that, apart from the piercing, could almost have been his own in the mirror, twenty years ago. Any comments on food and tea were superseded by a involuntary gasp of "Robin?"

The young man visibly flinched. "No one calls me that," he snapped back, looking as shocked as Severus. "Not anymore."

Not anymore? "What do they call you?" Severus asked.

"Kit." he replied, though the 't' was almost swallowed by glottalisation. The boy rubbed his forehead fretfully, as if he had a headache, and Severus realised guiltily that he'd been reaching legilimentic fingers towards the boy's unprotected mind.

Severus could barely work his brain enough to work the words free. He just stared at the boy. "Short for Christopher?"

"Yeah," he said, with an unspoken 'what's it to you?'. "Do you want some food? Coffee?"

"A large pot of tea and two full English," Severus replied sharply, not bothering to even ask Harriet what she would prefer. "Tell me- your mother's name… what is it?"

The boy scowled deeply. "I was a care kid," he snapped. "I don't have a mother." He disappeared back into the kitchen, Severus turning in his seat to watch him until he vanished.

"Do you… know him?" Harriet asked quietly.

"None of your business."

She looked hurt. Good. It helped to not be the only one who was hurting for a change. They waited in silence. Why on earth had he thought this would be a good idea? Clearly, he was too soft-hearted. He should have left her to Dumbledore, or Molly Weasley. The sooner he could offload her, the better.

It wasn't Kit (Robin?) who delivered their food and tea, but a plump, rosy-cheeked girl. After she'd set the plates down, she hesitated. "Kit wants to know…" she said slowly, "he wants to know if you knew someone called Annie Brandon."

Annie… "Yes," Severus replied softly. "I did."

He and Harriet ate their breakfasts in utter silence, every muscle in Severus' body trembling with tension. Kit did not reappear whilst they were there.

* * *

For three days, Severus could barely concentrate on anything, his mind always wandering back to the dark eyed young man. Could he possibly, maybe, be Severus' long-lost son? The boy would be nineteen now, around the age of that young man… but he'd searched- he'd searched so hard after Annie and Robin had vanished when Robin was four. He'd tried so many blood spells, trying to track his son's location, and all had come to nothing- there were occasional leads, pointing him to various places, but there was never any sign of either Robin or Annie there. It was as if they had vanished into thin air. He'd used plenty of confounding charms on muggles to gain access to Robin and Annie's medical records, but they cut off, suddenly, as if they'd vanished from the face of the planet. He'd even hired a magical investigator, but everything came up blank. There was no Robin Brandon, no Annie Brandon. But this boy… this Kit. He hadn't said that his mother was Annie, but he knew the name. Would Annie have used her real name after she'd vanished? He hadn't been able to find any trace of her, and by Merlin, he'd searched.

The boxes of things he'd taken from the house had sat in his cupboard, untouched, for almost fifteen years, but now, he found that he could not stay away. Whenever he passed the cupboard, he found himself pausing, his hand against the door. Finally, he decided that he was being a coward. He opened the door, pulled out the few boxes. Methodically, he began to unpack them in his living room. He'd sold or given away the majority of the contents of the house, unable to store it for long, but he had kept some things- mostly Robin's, knowing that when he found them, Robin would be living with him. He wouldn't have allowed Annie to have access to him ever again.

And now, as he held a small fluffy lion in his hands, a lion Lily had given Robin, he found himself reliving the sick fear when he discovered them gone, but also the quiet happiness he'd felt when he held Robin's warm little toddler body close to him. Tucking the lion under his arm, he pulled out a few more cuddly toys. It was stupid to have kept them, he thought. A teenaged Robin would not have wanted them.

After the toys came a few books- they'd lived on his shelves to begin with, but he'd packed them away after a few months, not wanting the reminders every time he needed to find a reference. A few childish books, some cuddly toys- was this really all he had left? He rubbed away a hot tear, feeling thoroughly foolish.

When the storybooks were set aside, his fingers met a smooth, leathery cover inside the box. He drew it out, already knowing what it was: the photograph album Lily had given Robin for his first birthday. Beginning with the day he was born, when Lily had named him, she'd always seemed to have her camera with her. He and Annie (mostly Annie) had added the photographs that came after. Some of the photos were of the wizarding type, but plenty were of the usual muggle variety, still and eternal. He looked at one of Robin at about three, giggling as he endlessly chased a ball around Annie's living room.

Did he even want to try to find out if the boy really was Robin? Did he want to deal with the pain and heartbreak of yet another false hope? And if the boy truly was Robin? What then? What could he do? Would he really want anything to do with a father he might not even remember?

But Severus found he couldn't put it behind him. He had to know, even if it was for the worse. Methodically, he began to remove all the wizarding photographs from the album, moving the muggle ones to fill the spaces. It wouldn't do to take the wizarding pictures out into the muggle world.

* * *

For a Saturday morning, he'd been worried that the cafe would be busy, but only one sleepy-looking woman in a BHS uniform sipped at her tea in the corner. Behind the counter, bent over the day's newspaper, was the same pink-cheeked girl he'd seen last time. She looked up. "Oh!" she said in surprise. "It's you!"

"I'm looking for the boy who was here last time," Severus said, not ready for empty pleasantries. "Kit."

She nodded, and vanished into the back. Severus heard a whispered conversation, frantic in its speed, before Kit appeared, practically pushed out into the open by his female colleague. "Uh… hi," he said, stiltedly.

He looked terrible, Severus mused. The circles beneath his eyes were a deep blue, making his skin look even more pallid under the faint rash of teenage bad skin. Had he looked so exhausted three days ago? "Is there somewhere we can speak?" Severus asked. "Privately?"

"Go in the back room," the girl urged. Kit nodded, his head jerking as if he were a marionette on strings. "Erm… come through," he said.

He led Severus through a dark little corridor, past the kitchen and into a tiny room, just big enough for a little round table and a few chairs. Curling safety notices and shift rotas were pinned to the wall. Severus squeezed himself into a chair, but Kit remained standing, his back against the door jamb and his arms crossed firmly against his chest. He had a chance to properly look at the boy now. He had one ear pierced, as well as the lip, Severus noticed, and the shadow of ink at the hem of his sleeve suggested a tattoo. "You knew my Mum," he said, and Severus' heart gave a sudden jump.

"Annie? Yes," he confirmed, unsure how much to say. He didn't want to scare the boy, but there was so much else he wanted to know.

Kit licked his lips, though they were so dry and cracked Severus doubted it did any good. "Where's that girl you were with?"

"With her friends," he said softly. He wasn't here to talk about Harriet bloody Potter.

Kit nodded and the fell into silence for a few moments. Severus was halfway through asking how old Kit was, just in confirmation, when the question the boy had clearly been stewing for days burst out. "Are you my father?"

Severus left a moment's slightly stunned silence before answering. "I believe so."

"Then why did you leave?" Kit cried out.

Severus frowned. "I could not sit out there forever, boy."

"Not that! When I was a kid- why did you leave me and Mum?"

Ah. So that was the tale that Annie had told. Severus had always wondered what Robin would think of their sudden departure- that Severus had left would seem to be an easy explanation to give, he supposed. "I never left. I came home one day, and you were gone."

Kit… Robin… was shaking his head frantically. "No. No… Mum said, she said that you left, that she couldn't keep the house because you'd walked out and she couldn't afford it…"

He was getting even more agitated, colour flushing his cheeks in a way that reminded Severus quite painfully of little-boy Robin. Could this really be… "I think it would be best if you sat down," Severus said quietly. Kit just glared at him with no apparent intention of sitting down. "Just to be sure," Severus said, "Your name is Robin Christopher Brandon?"

Kit nodded, once, sharply.

"And you were born on the 11th of February, 1978?"

"Yeah."

"Your mother was Anne Elizabeth Brandon, your father Severus Tobias Snape." He barely needed to ask, but he thought he should. He felt a draw to this boy, felt sure that this was the closest he'd been to his son in fifteen years.

Kit nodded again. The brightness in his eyes had spilled to tears, dripping down the sides of his nose. He rubbed them away with the edge of his sleeve. Severus kept a close eye on the boy as he reached into the pocket of his transfigured jacket to pull out an envelope. He'd decided not to bring the whole photograph album, but it had seemed sensible to bring at least one photograph. Without explanation, he held the envelope out to Kit.

"What's this?" Kit's voice was still shaky.

"You will never find out if you don't open it."

The boy's fingers shook so hard that the envelope dropped as he tried to fumble it open, and he had to bend to retrieve it. "It feels weird," he noted, his fingers rubbing against the parchment of the envelope. Finally he managed to draw the photograph out. After a few seconds of staring at it, his eyes flicked from the glossy paper to Severus, and back again. "Is this me?" he asked. "As a baby?"

"You were around two and a half years old," Severus said. He'd been careful to pick on where Robin would be old enough to have some defining features, not just a round, pink baby. He'd also chosen one of the very, very few to contain both himself and Annie. Admittedly, only part of his face was visible, but hopefully it would be enough for Kit to recognise. "That is your mother?"

Kit nodded.

"Do you remember me?" Severus asked softly.

The boy's voice was choked, and Severus had to listen more carefully than he might have to understand his flat, rough accent. "No… I never knew who my dad was. Mum said that he… you… left us."

"How is Annie?"

"Dead," Kit said harshly. "I told you, I was in care."

It had been a possibility, but Severus hadn't been sure if Annie was dead, or sequestered in the madhouse. "Please, won't you sit?" he asked again. "Tell me."

Kit shrugged, his eyes still fixed on the picture. "What's the point?" he asked. "It doesn't matter."

"It does," Severus said. "How did she die? When?"

"I should get back to work. Can I… can I keep this? I don't have any pictures of me as a baby."

Severus knew that. He had them all, squirreled away in a cardboard box. "You can. I did not intend to keep you from your work; I only wished to ask to meet later, at your convenience," Severus said. "When do you finish? I'll buy you dinner. What do you like to eat?" Merlin. He sounded ridiculous, like a fifteen year old boy asking his sweetheart to tea on Hogsmeade weekend.

"How do I even know you are my father?" Kit asked suddenly. "I mean, you know my name and when I was born, but you could have got hold of that from, I don't know, my birth certificate or something. And this looks like you, but they can do all kinds of stuff with photos, stick them together and make them look real."

Severus met his eyes squarely. "You asked if I was your father with no prompting, before you saw that picture. Why?"

Kit squirmed slightly. "You look a bit like me," he said. "Your eyes… Mum said I had my father's eyes. And no one's called me Robin in years. I don't think anyone really remembers that it's supposed to be my name."

"You were born at twenty minutes past five in the afternoon," Severus said, hoping to convince the boy with details. "I delivered you myself, in your mother's flat. You weighed five pounds and eleven ounces, and you had just a little dark hair. And your eyes were just as black then as they are now."

Kit shrugged. "I didn't know any of that, so how would I know if you were telling the truth?"

"I suppose you can't," Severus sighed. "If you are able to think of anything that would prove your parentage to you, I will gladly oblige.."

"Even a DNA test?"

"Without hesitation," Severus agreed. It was on the tip of his tongue to mention that a paternity potion would be easier, but if Kit didn't remember him, he wouldn't know about magic. He had feared that that might be the case- Robin had barely been aware of the magical when Annie stole him, after all.

The September that Robin would have been eleven, Severus had visited each muggleborn to begin Hogwarts along with Minerva. There had been one Robin amongst their number, but that had been a cherubic blonde little girl. Even having seen all of them, he had still awaited the welcoming feast with increasing agitation, hoping against hope that his son would be amongst the first years. He was disappointed. He called in every contact he or Minerva had in magical schools, making surreptitious enquiries about a dark eyed little boy of the right age,no matter the age. None had come to fruition, though he'd spent many weekends travelling to far flung locations to investigate 'maybes'. A year later, he'd managed to secure Robin's magical birth records, only to discover that he was a squib. That had been the point that he'd given up. None of the spells had worked, so he'd had every last hope pinned on finding Robin when he needed magical schooling.

But hope or no, a boy who was most likely his son was standing less than three feet from him. "I would be most appreciative if you'd agree to meet me again," Severus said stiffly. Kit's dark eyes were fixed firmly on the floor. "If nothing else, I would like to make sure you're safe, and happy."

That made the boy snort. "That would have been more useful about fourteen years ago," he said. "Fine. I'll meet you tonight. Five?"

"Where?"

Kit considered for a moment. "Perhaps here?" Severus suggested dryly.

"No," Kit said. "Market street- by the tram."

Severus nodded. At least the boy was sensible enough to choose a busy place to meet. "I will see you tonight."

* * *

He did wonder if the boy wouldn't turn up, if perhaps it had been a ruse to get rid of Severus. It was ten past five, and there was no sign of him. At quarter past, Severus was becoming agitated, and determined that at twenty past, he would leave. He was undecided about if he would return to the cafe another day, to confront the boy. But then the crush of people spat out a tall, gangly, black-eyed youth. He stood in front of Severus, stiff and uncomfortable. He glared. "Now what?"

"You're late."

Kit shrugged. "Yeah."

"Are you hungry?" Severus asked, his brows knitted tightly at the rudeness. Rude or not, Kit was almost painfully thin, he realised- rather like Severus himself in times of stress. The apron had hidden a lot of it earlier, but now, in the late afternoon sunshine, in jeans probably a good size too big and a tighter long sleeved black t-shirt, he could see the bird-like limbs, and realised that the angularity in Kit's face was as much thinness as bone structure. Kit shrugged again, and a wave of frustration rose in Severus. If the boy had been a student, he'd have had points taken, but he couldn't take points in this situation. He couldn't mete out any punishment, for the only thing he could do was leave. Leaving was not an option "We'll eat," he decided, though it was early. "Where shall we go? You choose- I don't know the area well anymore."

"Where'd you live, then?" asked Kit.

"Scotland.

"Do you work? What do you do?" Kit wanted to know.

Severus held up a hand. "You can ask all the questions you like, when you chose a place to eat."

After some consideration, he chose a burger. Severus wrinkled his nose in distaste, but Kit was once again looking at the ground, and didn't see. Severus reached out to lightly touch his shoulder. With a low gasp, Kit flinched away, his head snapping up so his flashing eyes could meet Severus'. "My apologies," Severus said, formality seeming the only option here. "Please, lead the way."

"I just wasn't expecting it," Kit snapped before turning away.

In a brightly lit, plasticky restaurant, Severus paid for two burgers, chips and cokes, then let Kit choose where to sit. The music was just loud enough that he didn't worry about being too overheard, not that he thought the haggard-looking mother with twin toddlers or the group of teenagers throwing fries at each other would really care. "I believe you had some questions?" Severus asked archly as Kit nibbled on a fry. "For your information, I am a schoolteacher."

"Oh," Kit said, selecting another fry. "Mum said you were a doctor."

"I trained to be a doctor- an obstetrician, in fact. However, I never completed the training."

"What's an obstetrician?" Kit stumbled over the unfamiliar word.

"A doctor who delivers babies. It's why I was able to deliver you."

"Oh." Kit fiddled with his food. "Are you married? Do you have kids?"

Severus looked up from examining the insides of his burger with mild distaste. "I am not married. I have one son. He's sitting across the table from me."

Kit flushed scarlet. "I'm not your kid. You were just the sperm donor."

Severus flinched. "I wanted to be your father."

"So what happened then?" The note of accusation in Kit's voice was clear.

Severus regarded his carefully. "I will tell you my story if you will tell me yours," he said. He wasn't usually a subscriber to the school of bargaining, but he had nothing over this boy, except information. He wasn't going to let it go lightly.

Kit folded the paper packet his straw had come in into a concertina. He'd taken precisely three bites of his burger, eaten three fries. "There's not much to tell."

So Severus began with a question that had been bothering him, one of many. "Why don't you go by Robin?"

"I didn't want to," Kit muttered.

Severus waited for something more, but it didn't the length of the silence grew so uncomfortable it seemed they could feel it between them like a barrier, Severus spoke again. "I was only eighteen when your mother told me she was pregnant," he began. "I didn't want to be a father, but I couldn't just leave her. She was… delicate."

"Mad," Kit supplied.

"I suppose so," Severus agreed heavily. "Her parents disapproved- they threw her out. They thought an unmarried daughter was shameful."

"And you wouldn't marry her. Maybe if you'd have married her, you'd have stayed together."

"Are you going to let me speak, or are you going to remind me of every mistake I have made in my life?" Severus hissed.

"Seems like you making those mistakes made my life shit," Kit grumbled.

Severus barely kept his hands from reaching over to slap the boy. He clenched them into tight fists in his lap. "I had every intention of raising you as my son, married or not," he growled. "I may not have lived in the same house, but I visited every day. I paid each and every bill, saw you clothed and fed and warm. I did bathtime and storytime and bedtime. I nursed you through illnesses. I was your _father_! You called me Daddy!"

The woman with the toddlers was beginning to look on with interest. Using the table as cover, Severus laid his fingers on his wand, securely tucked up his sleeve, and barely whispered a notice-me-not spell to give them more privacy. Kit's eyes were narrowed, but he didn't seem to notice the little magic. "So why don't I remember it?" he demanded. "I remember the house before we went to Canada, so why don't I remember you?"

"You went to Canada?" Severus said, his anger forgotten in surprise. He'd cast his net worldwide, of course, but he hadn't really expected Annie to have left the country. How would she have had the resources? He'd been unsure how she'd paid for survival in any case.

"Yeah."

"When did you come back to Britain?"

Kit nibbled cautiously on the end of a fry, watching Severus very carefully, as if he was very puzzled at the mercurial change of mood "I was five, I think," he said slowly. "I didn't go to school there, so I can't have been that old when we came back. It's a bit fuzzy."

"You were four and a half when your mother took you," Severus said thoughtfully. "You were meant to start Reception that September. Where did you live after that?"

"I'm not sure straight after- it was somewhere near Cambridge, I think. We went there a couple of times. Then Liverpool. Then I fucked up, and they sent me to Manchester when I was fourteen. I've been here since."

How had he not found them? Severus cursed himself, running back in his head to all the tracking spells, blood spells, even dark magic to find what was lost. He'd stopped at nothing, no barrier had been too great for Severus to scale. How had he not found a child as close as Cambridgeshire or Liverpool? He'd been to both of those places, and dozens more besides. The years in Liverpool and Manchester at least explained the odd thick accent that he could now hear as a merge of the two. "What do you mean, you 'fucked up'?" he asked softly.

Kit glared at him, and Severus suddenly had a glimpse of what his students were subjected to when he was eviscerating them for their lamentable schoolwork or abominable behaviour. No wonder they shrank away; he wanted to and he was a grown man who faced the Dark Lord on a regular basis. "What I said. I made a muck up of it, just like I have ever since, okay? Why are we only talking about me? I thought you were going to tell me where the fuck you've been for all my life?"

"I have spent years looking for you," Severus tried as hard as he could to keep his tone level and quiet. "I work as a teacher and a housemaster at a boarding school in the Scottish Highlands. Unfortunately, my life is not very interesting."

"Mine's not either," Kit countered.

The doors to the restaurant opened again, admitting a young couple. A few more teenagers had joined the rowdy group. Severus looked at the half-eaten food between he and Kit. "Are you still hungry?" he asked.

Kit gave one of his apparently ubiquitous shrugs. "Not really," he admitted. He'd eaten less than Severus, and Severus wasn't even fond of the greasy muggle fare. Really, the boy didn't manage enough to keep a bird alive. Severus had assumed that he wasn't fed enough, and the thought had broken his heart, but apparently, that wasn't the case. He just didn't eat, even when food was put in front of him.

"Perhaps you'd show me a little of Manchester?" Severus suggested. "It's been a long time since I was here- to be honest, I last visited before you were even born."

Kit narrowed his eyes. "What do you want from me?" He gestured to the tray between them. "Why're you buying me stuff? After so many years, why do you want to know me at all- why would you want a broken care kid?"

Merlin, he looked so _young_! His glistening eyes peeking out from behind his heavy, greasy fringe just made him look like a frightened child trying his very hardest to be brave. As much as Severus wanted to dismiss the concerns as ridiculous, working with the young denizens of Slytherin had at least taught him that sometimes, young people needed to be in charge of their own destinies, and he'd never been one to 'protect' children either. And no matter that this boy-child looked small and scared at this moment, he was nineteen years old, legally an adult in both muggle and magical worlds. "I could tell you that it's because I want to see you happy," he said after a moment's thought. "And that would not be a lie- but it is not the entirety of my reasoning. If that was the case, I could give you some money and an address, and leave the decision on contacting me up to you. But I am not a selfless man. I lost my son fifteen years ago, and I have felt the absence in every day since. I cannot reclaim those years, but I want to try to assuage my guilt at being unable to find you."

"So you want to play happy families?" Kit asked with a bizarrely familiar sneer. "I've been there, done that. I destroy happy families."

"It's too late for that in any case," Severus said. "There is too much past, too much history. But perhaps we could be friends?"

Kit snorted. "Perhaps."

"Shall we go?" Severus asked, and this time, Kit didn't argue

After the wrappers and uneaten food had been deposited in the bin, Kit led Severus back out into the August evening. "Where'd you want to go?"

"Take me somewhere you like."

Kit flushed a delicate pink as he thought, clearly uncomfortable. "I like to go down by the canals," he admitted quietly. "You can just walk and walk. I like to look into the boats. And I like the ducks."

That was far better than Severus had been hoping. He'd have just been glad to avoid a nightclub or amusement park (not that he knew of any in reach of central Manchester). The canals sounded perfect. He bestowed a rare smile on Kit. "Perhaps we should buy some bread for the ducks."

"I'm not a kid. And you shouldn't feed ducks bread. It's not good for them."

"Oh? I didn't know that."

They fell into silence as Kit led him down streets until they came to the side of the canal. "Down here," he said unnecessarily as he descended the steps onto the towpath.

Another few minutes had passed before Kit spoke again. "People kill themselves in the canal sometimes," he noted in a surprisingly conversational tone.

It took Severus a moment to process that. Was he trying to say that he had considered suicide? Considered it now? The thought had entered Severus' own mind too many times to count over his lifetime, and yet, somehow here he stood. But Kit didn't seem to be waiting for any particular response. It was apparently just a statement of fact. It did, at least segue nicely into the theme of death, and a question that was haunting Severus. "Kit… may I ask… how did your mother die?"

For a moment, it was as if Kit wasn't going to respond. "That's the first time you've used my name," he noted.

Was it? Severus hadn't noticed. He made a noncommittal noise.

"She took too many pills," Kit said softly. "Killed herself."

Severus had been afraid of that. "How old were you?"

"Seven."

Seven! The boy had lived longer as an orphan, for all intents and purposes, than he'd had parents. Kit didn't look at Severus as he walked. He kept his eyes on the murky water of the canal or on his feet as he set a slow pace that would have infuriated Severus at any other time, but right now, his anger was solely directed at Annie, for taking Robin from him and plunging him into this situation. No, he realised. It wasn't just Annie to blame. He had to shoulder that too. He'd always given in to Annie, always let Robin live with her, though he'd known that she wasn't fit. He should have taken Robin as soon as it became clear that Annie wasn't mentally stable enough to raise a child. He should never have sent Robin back to live with her after she'd left the toddler alone overnight. "I… I am so very sorry," he breathed.

"I'm used to it," Kit said dismissively. "I certainly wasn't the only care kid around with dead parents." Severus hardly knew how to begin to explain that he didn't necessarily mean to express sorrow at Annie's death, but at his own failure as a father… as anyone who had care of a child. He would not have allowed something similar to have happened to one of his Slytherins. He didn't have time to formulate his thoughts, let alone his words, before Kit began to speak again. His voice was so low that Severus had to step closer to be sure of hearing each word- at least the towpath was narrow enough that it was not uncomfortable to be close. He could tell from the beginning that this would be important. Kit was telling his story.

"I was at school that day," he began. "I didn't go to school all the time. Sometimes, Mum was too far Gone- she didn't get up, and she didn't eat or talk or anything. She just stared at the wall for hours. When I was off for a bit, I think the teachers used to get suspicious- the headmistress came once or twice, and some lady who I think was probably from social services. But Mum was always fine when they came, chatty and normal. And I didn't want anyone to know. Everyone else had normal parents.

"She'd been bad for a couple of days, but I was big enough then to kind of get myself ready. My teacher gave me lunch when I didn't have any- I think she knew, kind of. She never told me off when I didn't have my homework, or my uniform wasn't right, you know? I think she figured that I was getting big enough, that I could handle it. But when I came home that day, Mum was still in bed, and the curtains were drawn. I left her for a bit, but there wasn't any food, and I was hungry. Sometimes she'd give me money to go to the shop, so I tried to wake her." Here, Kit's voice broke oddly. Severus recognised every bit of Annie he described. "When I shook her, she was all cold, and her face was all wrong. I can still-" he gasped in a breath, "-still see it. And I kind of knew she was dead, you know? But I kind of didn't. I went back to my room for a bit, then to the kitchen, but there wasn't anything- no cereal, or tins, or anything. I'd eaten the rest of the bread already- I picked the green bits off. Is it weird that I remember that?"

For the first time since he'd started talking, he looked at Severus, just a sideways glance from under his over-long fringe. "No. No, I don't think it is. Memory is strange." Severus' arms itched to hold the boy, hug him close, and then hunt down something that could make it all better. If only the time-turners hadn't all been destroyed!

Kit seemed content with Severus' hoarse contribution. "Sometimes it feels like I remember all the weird stuff about that day, and none of the important stuff. I tried to go to bed, but I just kept thinking about her. So I went and crawled into bed next to her for a bit. Normally, she'd at least snuggle up to me, even if she was Gone. But she didn't. She just lay there, all stiff, and her eyes were open and she never blinked. And then it was sort of creepy, watching her face.

"She'd always said that I couldn't tell, that I shouldn't talk to anyone, but I was really scared. There was this old lady who lived in the flat downstairs- if she saw me, she'd always smile and say hello, and she tried to ask me in for tea. She did give me sweets a few times, so I figured she was nice. I knocked on her door, and said that there was something wrong with my Mum." His voice was stronger now, strangely. "I don't remember that much after that. There were lots of people. They took me to hospital- I think they took her too- and they kind of fussed over me for a bit, and talked a lot, did some tests or something. I was there for a few days before they let me go, and then I went to an emergency foster placement with Mr and Mrs. James."

Severus applied his own medical knowledge to flesh out the bones of Kit's tale, making assumptions of parallels between the magical and muggle worlds. If he'd been in hospital for more than a brief sit with the nurses whilst social services sorted a foster placement, there would be a reason. To be there that long, he'd have been admitted as a patient. He had probably been malnourished, possibly dehydrated. Severus hoped that it had been merely neglect, and not outright physical abuse, but there would have been suspicions. Even in the magical world, even in Slytherin where most students were precious, longed-for pureblooded children, he'd had a couple of first years come to him in such a state that the department of magical law enforcement were involved. He didn't want to press for details, through, in case he broke Kit's willingness to tell him the tale.

"They were nice there, I guess. They took me to the science museum, and let me have lots of ice cream. After a bit though, they found me a place in a group home. I shared a bedroom with a boy who was called Chris." Kit fell silent for a few steps. "I… I didn't like people calling me Robin. Mum called me Robin. And I didn't want to be Robin. I wanted to be someone else. So Mrs. James said maybe I could use my middle name, and she called me Christopher. But when I went to the group home… Chris had been there longer, and he didn't like it. So someone said… maybe Kit? It's short for Christopher, but it didn't sound like Chris. We couldn't get confused." He gave another sidelong glance at Severus. "Do you mind?"

"Mind?"

"That I changed my name. Mum said you picked Robin. She picked Christopher. I… I think I felt like she was with me… sort of." He gave a hollow laugh. "She was more use dead than when she was Gone."

"I don't mind," Severus murmured. It wasn't his place to mind.

Kit turned his eyes up to the clouded sky. " After a while, Chris' Dad got out of prison, and he left. His Mum was dead too. After that, I shared with Ben, but he got adopted with his baby sister- people liked babies, and Ben wasn't going to let her go alone."

Kit walked silently for a bit, and Severus wondered if that was all he was going to get. "Did you live there long?" he prompted gently. "Was this still in Liverpool?"

"Yeah, it was Liverpool. And I didn't stay long. Not that time," Kit said. "A few months, I suppose, before they found me a foster place. It was supposed to be permanent, but…" he gave an awkward shrug, "it wasn't. They had a couple of their own kids- an adopted boy, Kyle. He was, erm, thirteen, I think, when I went there. No- maybe he was fourteen. And a girl- Abbie- she was theirs, and she was five. Kyle had… issues. They'd adopted him as a baby, but he wasn't right- he was born addicted. I guess they wanted to help kids who'd had a tough start or something. But after a couple of years… Abbie got sick. Leukaemia. And Kyle… he got angry a lot. I guess I was there, and little enough for him to push around."

Severus couldn't help himself. "Did he hurt you?" he demanded, his voice low and dangerous.

Kit gave a wry grin and held up his left arm. "Broke my wrist. That was the end of that. They didn't have time for me, not with Abbie too." He didn't tell Severus about the months of bumps and bruises, the doctor's visits where his foster parents had worried that Kit, too, might be ill based on the bruises that bloomed without apparent reason on his body- he'd been far too afraid of Kyle, and too afraid of being sent away, to admit their origin. And even when physical illness had been ruled out, that they'd worried about the nightmares and the bedwetting and the lies. Because they were sure there was no way that Kit could possibly have just _found_ himself outside in the middle of the night when all the doors were locked, no matter how much Kit swore that it was true. There was no way that the gas hob could have just lit _itself_ when only Kit had been in the kitchen. And that between an increasingly violent son with foetal alcohol syndrome and a daughter with cancer, they just didn't have the time or energy for a broken foster child. He certainly didn't tell Severus that the end to that foster placement hadn't come when his wrist was put in plaster; it had come three weeks later when his foster father had found Kit on the bathroom floor, the bathmat slowly soaking up the blood from the two clumsy cuts Kit had made on his right forearm with a razor.

"So they found you another family to live with?"

"Turns out it's not so easy to find foster placements for eleven year old kids with baggage," Kit said wryly. "I was back in the group home for few years that time- I was thirteen when they found me another placement."

"In Manchester."

"No, that was after," Kit explained. "I'm kind of tired- do you mind if we sit for a bit?" He gestured to a bench tucked into a little alcove in the wall between the canal and the factory they were walking past.

Clearly, the boy did not spend his days climbing the endless stairs at Hogwarts. He did look a little unwell. Then again, he had worked today, and he was telling a very emotional tale. Severus agreed. Sitting was no hardship, he just hoped it didn't stop Kit talking. He itched to ask more questions, almost as much as he just wanted to take the gangly boy in his arms and comfort him. He did neither. He waited.

They sat in silence as a family of ducks paddled past. Across the canal, a man was mopping down the roof of a brightly painted canal boat. Kit nodded towards him. "He looks happy. It might be nice to live on a boat… You could go anywhere you wanted." He paused, his lips pursed speculatively. "As long as it was by water, I suppose."

"Where do you live?" Severus asked. Kit's eyes widened, and Severus hastened to add that he didn't need to know the address, or even where it was, if Kit did not wish to share. "I just want to know that you are safe and comfortable," he assured the boy.

"I live in a shared flat," Kit said after a moment's thoughtful pause. "It's near Cheetham Hill. It's fine"

"I don't know the area," Severus admitted. "I've only ever visited Manchester to go shopping."

"Where'd you grow up?"

"Cokeworth," Severus supplied. "Your mother too. We went to school together."

"I didn't know that."

The man on the barge finished his cleaning and disappeared inside. Severus wondered if he lived alone. There were lace curtains at the window. Probably not, then- he probably had a wife. "Will you tell me more?" he asked carefully.

Kit drew his legs up, resting his heels on the edge of the bench and his chin on his knees. "I don't think I've ever really told it all before," he said. "Everyone else always had my records, all the stuff written down in my file. They already knew everything about me… or they knew everything they thought they needed." He gave a deep sigh. "Where'd I get to… right. The second foster placement when I was thirteen. Jean and Bill. They had three foster daughters. I was only there for six months, though. Then another three months in the same group home, and then they transferred me to Manchester. That was an all-boys home, for two years. Then when you turn sixteen, you're on your own. My social worker helped me get a job at the cafe."

Severus didn't miss the lack of detail, not the sudden speed of Kit's voice as he skipped over three years of his life in barely any words at all. "What happened at the foster placement, Kit?"

The boy's fingers had tightened in the worn fabric at the knees of his jeans, and his answer was barely more than a whisper. "It didn't work out."

"What did they do to you?" Severus already wanted to strangle a boy who'd broken his son's wrist; to shake every last social worker who had just put him in a home without trying to find his remaining parent. Whatever Kit was hiding, it wasn't good. How angry would he be? What could it be, that it was worse than lying beside his dead mother?

"If I tell you, you'll go," the boy whispered. "I can't tell you."

"I won't go."

Kit's face twisted. "They sent me away so I could make a 'fresh start'. It's on my records, but none of the other kids knew. Not here." He paused, moodily watching the murky water. "I saw my records, not long before I was sixteen. I was in the care home manager's office, and he had to go and deal with a fight. But he left my file there, on his desk. When I was a kid, they told me that my Mum died by accident, but she didn't. It was written in there- she committed suicide by overdose. How stupid was I to have believed them, all those years?"

"Not stupid at all." Severus knew a diversion when he saw one.

"Anything I'd ever said to one of the social workers, letters about me from the foster placements… it was all in there. Everything. All I was was this file, stuffed full of paper. Even before Mum died… there were medical records and social services reports and school reports." He turned his head on his knees, looking up at Severus. "You haven't got a bloody notepad on your knee, at least. And I could tell you anything, and you wouldn't know if it was true or not, because you've never seen the file. I could tell you that I was a perfect kid, all A's at school, and maybe you'd believe me." He gave a hollow little laugh. "But then I'd be off at some university. Not churning out coffee in a greasy spoon. You must be clever- a teacher. What do you teach?"

"Chemistry." That was an easy lie, a muggle subject that Kit might understand. "Did you not like school?"

Kit climbed to his feet, wandered to the water's edge and peered down. "I liked some school," he admitted. "I liked the teachers who didn't just pity you because you were in care. Some of them had this snarky little smile, you know? Like they were a bloody saint for teaching you. But if there was any trouble, the care kid always got the blame. The other kids knew it too; they could blame anything on me- throwing stuff when the teacher's back was turned, chatting… saying I was distracting them. And I'd land up with the headmaster." Severus wondered if the problems that had seen Kit expatriated from Liverpool to Manchester had been academic. "But some teachers were okay. They treated you just like everyone else. I had this French teacher- Monsieur Kilbride. He was Scottish, but because he taught French, we had to use Monsieur, not Mr. He was nice. He said I was good at it, and sometimes he let me spend break in his classroom, and he'd talk to me in French."

"You can speak French?" Severus asked, almost surprised.

Kit gave an uncomfortable shake of his shoulders. "A bit. I got a B in my GCSE. It was my best, by a long way."

"Mon français n'est pas bon," Severus said, curious to see the response.

"Mais vous en parlez maintenant," Kit countered. He answered quickly, naturally, without thinking. Severus wasn't lying, his French was not perfect by a long way. He had to think about it. The sounds seemed to come naturally to Kit.

His curiosity piqued, Severus tried an experiment. He began to count in Latin. He got to three before Kit joined in, whirling to look at him in utter surprise, the numbers right up to ten spilling perfectly from his lips. Severus had stopped. "What… what was that?" he asked, amazed. "I knew it, I knew the sounds, but…"  
"You were counting," Severus informed him. "In Latin."

"But I don't know Latin!"

"I'd just started to teach you a bit when you and your mother disappeared," Severus said. "You seem to have remembered it. Robin… Kit… are you really sure you can't remember me at all? Can't you remember Hogwarts? Or Hagrid, or the tabby cat you called Kitty?"

Kit's face screwed up in an odd way, and he raised his hand to rub at his forehead. "Maybe. No. I don't know!" he snapped. "God, I've got such a headache all of a sudden."

Severus was more than suspicious. He needed more… more information. Legilimency would hurt Kit, he was sure- it often caused pain in muggles, and as a squib, Kit would have very little more by way of protection. "You're probably tired," he suggested. "And thirsty. Come. There must be somewhere near here where we can get something to eat and drink- you barely touched your food earlier."

Leaving the towpath, they managed to find a slightly down-at-heel but mercifully quiet pub, clearly the haunt of local old men who sipped on their pints and made their expert prognosis on the state of the track for the horses. Severus parked a remarkably recovered Kit at a table tucked into a shadowed corner and went to the bar, coming back with two pints of lemonade and some crisps. "I didn't know which flavour you liked," he explained, setting his selection of ready salted, salt and vinegar and cheese and onion in the middle of the stained table. Kit took the cheese and onion. Severus picked the ready salted and watched Kit lick the seasoning left from his first crisp from his fingertips. "Do you remember anyone a bit weird from your childhood?" he asked, carefully sounding casual. "It would have been when you were quite young."

"Most of Mum's friends were a bit weird," Kit replied with a snort of laughter. "She had a couple of boyfriends- is that what you mean?"

It was surprising news to him indeed that Annie had had any romantic relationships, but that was probably irrelevant. "I mean someone who might have taken a specific and perhaps unusual in you, and your memories. Someone who might have dressed a strangely, like they didn't quite know what clothes went with what."

Kit shrugged. "I suppose Uncle Albus always looked a bit like he'd got muddled up in a charity shop," he said. "He wore dresses sometimes- he didn't seem to know the difference."

Severus' blood turned to ice in his veins. "Albus?" he asked urgently, leaning forwards across the table. Albus was not a common name, especially not for a muggle. "You knew a man called Albus? What was he like? What did he look like? When did you meet him?"

Kit looked a bit taken aback at the sudden interest, leaning back to keep a distance between them. "Erm… He was old- really old, and he had a really long beard. I don't think I've ever seen one as long. And long hair. He looked a bit like a tramp, to be honest. He visited Mum a few times, and he always liked to talk to me a bit before I went to bed."

Severus' hands clenched into fists so tight his short nails dug crescents into his palms, the sharp zing of pain keeping him grounded enough not to scream. Albus had seen his son. Albus had known where Robin was! Suddenly, it all made sense- how Annie had hidden from him. A secret keeper, perhaps, stopping him finding them, taking him right to where they were, but leaving him blind. He'd been to Liverpool a few times, and to Ely, in Cambridgeshire, led there by tracking spells that had frustratingly fizzled out. When he thought back, the dates seemed right. "When did you last see him?" he ground out.

Wide eyed, Kit had to stop to think. "I dunno… a bit before Mum died. Maybe a few months before?"

"You never saw him afterwards? He never came to visit you at any point after that?"

Kit shook his head. "Why?" he asked. "Why is he so important?"

Severus could barely focus through the rage. "Because I know Albus," he growled. "And he knew- he knew you'd been taken from me, he knew I was looking for you, and he told me he had no idea where you were!"

"How do you even know it's the same person?"

"You said it yourself- you've never seen a beard so long. How many very old men called Albus with waist-length beards and hair do you think there are?"

"There must be more than one…" Kit hedged.

Severus gave a derisory snort. "I doubt it. There may not be any soon- he'll be lucky to be alive when I am finished with him."

"If he's still alive now, it can't be the same man. He must have been at least ninety then!" Robin countered.

"You'd be surprised." Severus was utilising every shred of self-restraint he had not to immediately floo back to Hogwarts and hunt down the Headmaster. He'd hidden his son from him, wiped Robin's memory- and then just abandoned the child to the system! "Oh, I am _quite_ certain it is the same man. He will pay."

Kit clearly didn't believe him. He shrugged. "I bet he died," he said. "He was ancient."

Severus flexed his fingers carefully, easing out the knotted tendons so he could grip his glass. "I think both of us have had quite an eventful enough evening," he said carefully. "Thank you for seeing me, for telling me about what has happened to you."

"You're leaving," Kit said flatly. "I knew I'd scare you off."

Severus couldn't help himself. He reached one hand across the table, gripped Kit's wrist. "No," he said. "No. I am taking my leave only temporarily. I have every intention of seeing you again, Kit, if you will allow it. I just think we both need some time to process, and I need to find Albus."

With a sad shrug, Kit agreed. "I guess."

"I have some things that were yours when you were a child," Severus said. "Would you like them? It's not much- some books, a few stuffed animals. Some more photographs."

That was clearly a shock to Kit. "You have my stuff? After all these years? Is… do you still live in Mum's old house?"

"No- the house I sold. I couldn't afford to keep it when it became clear that finding Annie wasn't going to be quick. I sold the furniture too, but I couldn't bring myself to just throw away your things. I hoped that you would be back with me soon. As the years went by… I couldn't quite bear to dispose of your belongings."

Kit was crying, heavy, silent tears overflowing his eyes to drip down his cheeks. "I never thought…" he gasped, his voice catching in his throat.

Severus gave his wrist a squeeze. "You were always very loved," he said. "I can't put right the past, but I am going to do my very best to change the future."

"Bloody hell, I'm pathetic," Kit muttered, pulling his wrist away so he could mop up the tears with the back of his hand. "You want to meet again, though?"

"Of course."

"Tomorrow?"

Severus considered his options. In fact, he wanted to take charge of this offshoot of his family tree at this precise moment, take Kit home like he was a lost puppy. But there were considerations to taken into account. He could not take the boy to Hogwarts. Spinner's End was an option- he had spent some of his salary on repairs and refurbishments through the years, and it was now at least habitable. But it would look suspicious. It would be suspicious. Kit, rightly, had worried about Severus' motivations, and to insist that the boy come home with him would be irregular in the extreme. Besides, it was well over an hour away by muggle transportation, and Severus was utterly unfamiliar with the bus and train systems now that he was grown and could apparate. It was probably too late to even get to Cokeworth by public transport at this time- it was after seven o'clock.

There were other considerations too. He needed to find Dumbledore, and he could not let Kit see or hear what he would have to say to the Headmaster, or the curses that were at the tip of his tongue. Then he needed to make other preparations, decide how much he was going to tell Kit about his life, about magic. He needed to consult with memory specialists to see about reversing what he supposed was obliviation, especially so long after the fact. He needed time. "We need some time to digest this," he said. "Not tomorrow. Do you work Monday?"

"I finish at two on Mondays."

"Then perhaps I could meet you then, at your cafe?"

Kit nodded, then graced Severus with a shaky smile. "Yeah."

"Do you live far from here?" Severus asked. When he discovered it was a good hour's walk, he insisted on depositing Kit into a taxi, despite the younger man's qualms which Severus suspected to be worries about the cost. "Here," he said, pressing something into Kit's palm. "Take this."

Kit opened his hand to reveal a wodge of notes. "I can't take this!" he protested. "There's well over a hundred quid here!"

"I know. Take it. I want you to have it." He urged the shocked boy into the waiting taxi. "I'll see you on Monday."

Kit resisted. His hand wrapped around Severus' wrist. "I slept with two girls," he whispered, his eyes desperately searching Severus' face. "One of them was my foster-sister. They wrote 'precocious sexual promiscuity' on the notes, but they called it rape to my face. That's why they sent me to Manchester. I was only thirteen, and I didn't hurt them, so I wasn't put into prison. But I get it, if you don't want anything to do with me."

After a moment's stunned silence, Severus gave Kit's shoulder a squeeze. "I will see you on Monday," he repeated, and gave Kit a gentle push towards the taxi.

Thirteen. Well into wizarding puberty, and a perfectly normal age for a teenage boy to start experiencing sexual urges that would be inappropriate in the muggle world. Yet another failure for Severus. No! It was yet another failure caused by Albus Dumbledore's meddling. Something else to lay at the old man's feet.

As soon as the lights of the car turned the corner, Severus began his hunt for a quiet alleyway from which to apparate. Arriving at his accustomed spot at the side gate of Hogwarts, he began the long trek up to the castle, his anger not abating one iota for all the distance to the headmaster's office. But no matter how loudly he shouted the password, the gargoyle would not budge. He had just kicked the unyielding stone when Minerva found him, her tartan dressing gown clutched tight around her as she followed the noise. "Severus!" she cried. "What on earth are you doing?"

He whirled to face her. "Where is Dumbledore?" he demanded. "I need to see him. This moment!"

"He's on his holidays," Minerva informed him. "He went last night. What is it? Is it the Dark Lord? Has something happened?"

"He took my son! He took Robin from me, Minerva!"

"He did what? Severus, you're not making any sense," Minerva said, her voice low and soothing. "It's been years since you lost Robin. Come on. Come back to my rooms, and tell me."

"No! I need Dumbledore!"

Minerva had taken his elbow and was firmly guiding him down the corridor towards her rooms. Severus was too distraught to fight. "We will find out where he has gone," she promised. "But for now, come and sit down, and tell me what has happened."

* * *

By Monday lunchtime, Severus was no further forward in finding Albus. He'd left no forwarding address, and not even Minerva knew where he went for his annual fortnight's holiday. Severus could only wait, his anger brewing, until the headmaster deigned to return. The memory specialist he'd consulted at St. Mungo's that morning had said that it was impossible to guess how much damage had been done without an examination, but Severus had at least packed up all of Robin's- now Kit's, he supposed- things, with the exception of the wizarding photographs. He'd need to find a way to carefully introduce the wizarding world to the young man, especially if it caused issues with Dumbledore's cursed mindwipe.

He'd cast a featherlight charm on the box that held Kit's belongings, but he couldn't risk shrinking it. Kit would wonder where he'd stashed the box. And now, at half past one, he was nervously approaching the cafe. He knew he was early, but he just couldn't quite wait. Perhaps he would have a pot of tea to pass the time until Kit was ready.

He pushed open the door, balancing his box carefully. The girl from the previous two visits was gone, replaced by a haggard-looking woman wiping the tables, her hair messily scraped back and her eyes red-rimmed. She looked up at him, her lips opening in a small gasp. He approached her, his box wedged on his hip. "Is Kit here?"

"You're… you must be his father," she breathed.

"Yes. I had arranged to meet him, but I'm a little early."

She was shaking, he noticed. What was going on? She glanced worriedly around at the few people finishing their lunch. "Please, won't you come through to the back for a moment?"

Every one of the senses Severus had honed as a spy were on high alert. Shifting his suspiciously light box carefully in his arms, he managed to work his wand loose from his sleeve so it would drop into his palm at a twitch, and followed the woman's retreating form into the dark back corridor. His eyes darted, noting the pinboard with curled posters on food hygiene and proper care for burns, the cobweb in the empty bulb socket above his head, and he strained to hear anything untoward above the clatter and splash of dishwashing from the kitchen. Shed led him into the same cramped backroom, empty. She gestured. "Sit down," she invited.

He did, but not before sweeping his eyes over each corner and wall for anything wrong. Sliding his box onto the table, he took the seat that put his back into the far corner. "Is something wrong? Where is Kit?" he asked, carefully covering his fear. Was this woman going to hold him to account for Kit's misfortunes? He deserved it, but he felt more like he was about to be beset by Death Eaters than taken to task. The worry had niggled at the back of his mind that this could be an elaborate Death Eater raid, but there had been none of the warnings that he would expect. It had all been too happenstance. He could not believe that the Dark Lord knew about Harriet and had not launched a raid, could not believe that he'd laid plans on the hope that Severus would stumble into this very cafe. He could not believe that the Dark Lord had known about his son and not immediately summoned him for torture.

The woman sank into a chair, every line of her soft with exhaustion. "I don't know how to tell you this- I don't think there's any good way at all, so I'm just going to say it. Kit was found dead early yesterday morning."

"What?" Severus snapped sharply. He'd misheard. He must have misheard. She could not possibly have said that Kit was dead.

"I'm so very sorry," she said, tears welling in her own eyes. "He got in the way of a drug deal, the police think- he was stabbed."

"If he does not wish to see me, I understand!" Severus thundered. "But you cannot torment me so- it is cruel! He is my son!"

"I would never lie about such a thing- I'm a mother myself!" she snapped back "Kit's worked for me for four years! You have known him a few days. Don't think that I don't care!" She took in a great gulp of breath, then another, visibly forcing herself to relax as Severus just gasped. "I'm sorry," she said, quieter now. "I shouldn't have shouted at you. I've had a day to try to come to terms with it, and you haven't." She leaned over so she could open the door. "Rosie? Would you make some tea, please, and bring two mugs through for us?"

A few moments later, the plump girl of his previous visits peered in, her hands encased in thick washing up gloves. "He came?" she asked, then saw Severus and promptly burst into tears. It clearly wasn't her first bout of crying for the day- her eyes were crimson and tired. "I'm so sorry," she sobbed.

The woman stood, pulled the girl in close for a hug. "Hush, darling," she said. "Come on. Leave the rest of the dishes, and get some tea started, love. We could all do with it."

"Kit always washed the big pans for me," she sobbed, flinging herself out of the room and back to the kitchen.

Severus was cold, so cold, the kind of bone-deep freeze that came in the recovery from cruciatus. The woman sat down. "You have me at a disadvantage," he said. His voice sounded hollow even in his own ears. "I am unsure who you are."

She gave a wan, awful smile. "I'm Val," she said. "I own the cafe. Kit's worked here since he was fifteen and the social worker thought a few hours work on a Saturday would be good for him. That was Rosie, my daughter." With another deep breath, she let her tense shoulders fall, and closed her eyes for a few long seconds. Severus barely noticed.

His brain was as frozen as his limbs, the impossibility of the whole situation seeping deep into every muscle and tissue. "He can't be," he whispered roughly, his voice not reacting to his command. "It cannot be true. I had just found him again… my son!" An anguished wail dropped from his numb lips. "I have brought his belongings!" He turned his hard eyes on Val. "You must be lying. Tell me you are lying."

She shook her head softly, her own eyes full of tears. "We had a phone call at home at about eight yesterday morning, from the police. Our phone number had been in Kit's wallet. I had to-" she stopped for a moment, trembling- "I had to identify his body. There was no one else. We went to his flat, but they said he'd moved out a couple of weeks ago. He might have been squatting- he's done that before, until I found out and moved him into our living room to make him find somewhere decent. I don't know where his money goes-you don't make much in this business, but I pay- paid- him enough to pay his rent and feed himself." She brushed aside a stray tear. "I loved that boy," she informed Severus shakily. "His social worker warned us when we took him on that it wouldn't be easy, and by God, sometimes it wasn't, but I loved him like he was family, you know?" She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket to blow her nose. "The police released his body to the undertakers a few hours ago. They said he'd have a public health burial, but I didn't want that- he'd be in an unmarked grave, and that's not right. So don't worry. We'll see to it. We'll look after him."

"I will pay whatever needs to be paid." Severus swpt a hand through his hair. How had this day gone so horribly wrong? "It is my duty." He closed his eyes.

A rough hand rested on his shoulder, calloused and cracked from hard work. "We can have that conversation later. I am so very sorry, Mr. Snape. He was so excited to finally meet his father that we barely heard anything else on Saturday afternoon. It's terrible, and made even more so by how little time you had together."

Severus knew what the next words should be. He was supposed to thank her for her words, but he couldn't get anything past the constricted muscles of his throat. She patted gently. "I'm going to go and see what on earth Rosie has done with that tea." He heard the door open, but not close, and he glanced up. She was looking at him with an odd, pained expression on her face. "Would you like to see him?" she asked. "You can visit his… his-" her voice squeaked, then she hesitated. "His body. Maybe it would help."

"Yes," he said hoarsely, the single word straining his throat. "It would."

"I'll telephone the undertaker and arrange it," she promised.

* * *

An hour later, insufficiently fortified with tea, he approached the address Val had given him. She'd offered to come but he couldn't imagine having someone else with him when he did this. He pushed open the door of the unassuming little building. A woman with a gentle smile looked up from a desk. He looked around. This was not what he'd been expecting. He had thought it would be clinical, not a bright waiting room with flowers and a soft-looking settee. "Hello. How can we help you?"

His eyes darted from the tall vase of chrysanthemums on her desk to the painting of a lake in moody blues and purples. "I… I," he stuttered helplessly. He swallowed hard and began again. "My name is Severus Snape. My son is…"

"Kit," she said with a sad smile. "Yes, of course. We were expecting you. Please, won't you have a seat for a moment, and I'll just go and make sure everything is ready for you."

He perched uncomfortably on the edge of the deeply- cushioned sofa. He had no idea what was going to happen. Val had said that they'd let him see the body- but she said Kit had been stabbed. He wouldn't just look asleep, surely? Would there not be significant injury? Severus had seen plenty of dead bodies, and he'd seen plenty of victims of torture. He was no stranger to injuries, but it didn't seem right that just anyone should be able to view such things. He wondered if Kit had died quickly? He hoped so. His thoughts were interrupted by the return of the receptionist. "He's all ready for you," she said softly. "You can spend as long as you'd like. Would you like me to sit with you?"

"I would rather be alone." Did his voice sound so shaky outside of his head?

"That's not a problem. I'll be just out here if you want me," she told him. "Please, feel free to ask any questions that you have. I'm afraid he's not in his own clothes, so he might look a little unfamiliar." And then, she led him through the door at the end of the room. "Remember, I am just out here if you need me." She shut the door softly without waiting for Severus' response, and it was a good thing, for no response was forthcoming.

It only took a few steps for him to reach the draped platform where Kit lay. Severus had been secretly hoping against hope that there had been some mistake, that he would get here and there would be some other boy- someone else's son. But he was unmistakable, even with his eyes closed and looking almost like a schoolboy, dressed in a nondescript white buttoned shirt. A blanket draped across his legs and abdomen, and he was deathly, ghostly pallid, as if he had been completely drained of blood. But he was most certainly the same boy Severus had seen, had talked and walked with. He didn't look as if he'd met a grisly end- the muggles clearly knew their work in making corpses appear acceptable. There was a scrape on one cheek that hadn't been there on Saturday, but other than that, there was no evidence of struggle.

His legs shook, threatening to give out. A chair was placed thoughtfully beside the platform where Kit lay, and he sank into it gratefully. He blinked his uncomfortably, achingly dry eyes, feeling rather awkward. His head pounded with the headache that had been with him since Val had told him.

Should he speak? Would it be ridiculous to speak to him?

The receptionist hadn't said that he shouldn't touch Kit, and suddenly, Severus felt the desperate need for some physical contact. He knew, of course, that the hand he took would be cold and stiff, but to touch him at least felt like something. Waxy, but it was Kit. Robin. This was the same hand he'd held when Robin had been just little, the same flesh and bones, tendons and muscle and veins. From beneath the cuff of the shirt, a flicker of ink showed. The tattoo of which Severus had caught only the barest glimpse. He had to know- he had to know what marked his son's left arm, as his own was marked with the Dark Lord's brand. His fingers fumbled with the button at the cuff, the folded the starched material back.

It was a snake, curling around Kit's wrist and up his arm. The unexpected sigil of his house gave Severus a start. But it was not the only thing that marked Kit's pale arms. Scars climbed his forearms like ladders, some faded a white so pale it could barely be seen, some still angry and new. Two towards his elbow were still scabbed over. Severus knew exactly what caused scarring like this. Kit had done it to himself over the span of years, trying to let out the self-loathing with the blood. Taking his son's hand in both of his and bringing their clasped trinity to his bent forehead, Severus gasped in a deep breath and screamed. In the resounding stillness left behind, he heard the click of the door behind him, but he did not turn. A moment later, the door closed again, and he was alone again with Kit.

For over an hour, he sat by Kit's utterly still body, his mind ticking over plan after plan. Nothing could bring Kit back now save the mythical Hallows in the story he'd read to Robin when he was just a little boy. He knew better than to believe in fairy tales. But continuing as if this had never been was not possible.

When his knees had grown stiff and his hands tingled from lack of circulation, locked around Kit's cold one, he finally stood. Methodically, he rolled down the shirt sleeve, refastened the plastic muggle button, and laid one hand on Kit's shining dark hair as if in benediction. "I will see you again," he promised. And then, without a backward glance, he left the room.

As he closed the door softly behind him, the receptionist stood up, sympathy in her eyes. "Can I get you anything?" she asked. "Tea, or water?"

"I would like to speak to someone about funeral arrangements," Severus said.

"Of course. Mr. Frobisher is still here- he's one of our undertakers. Let me just tell him you'd like to meet."

It was another hour of discussions of coffins and headstones and plots before Severus found himself emerging into the street. It felt as if it should be dark, midwinter, pelting with rain. But the August sunshine was taunting him, bright and so annoyingly cheery.

He didn't have time for sunshine. He had things to do.

First, a trip to Gringotts to transfer funds into muggle currency to pay for the funeral expenses. Then he had letters to write, preparations to make. Ten o'clock that evening saw him at his desk, his fingers smudged to the knuckles with ink, parchment piled around him in drifts. By half-past, he had corralled it all into neat piles, spelled to go to the right place at the right time. Only one task remained to him.

His mind was utterly calm as he walked out to the small gate he favoured as egress from Hogwarts' grounds. His fingers were quick and sure as he shrugged off the robe he'd donned for warmth in the dungeons, frigid even in August and rolled up his sleeve. His own forearm was not laddered with scars, but it bore the mark of his own youthful hatred in the form of a skull and snake. He touched the tip of his wand to the Mark- a signal to the Dark Lord that he had information to share.

No more than a few minutes passed until the Mark burned, the signal that the Dark Lord was ready to receive him. Another touch of his wand, and the hook of the portkey spell built into the mark activated, yanking him through the swirling void and spitting him out on the fine marble floor of the Malfoy's ballroom. The Dark Lord sat in splendour on the throne he'd had made. "Severus," he hissed sibilantly, "what a pleasant surprise. What do you have for me, my faithful servant?"

Nagini slithered around her master's feet, her tongue flickering to taste the air. Severus approached, dropping to his knees, careful to avoid the snake, and lifted the hem of Voldemort's robes in his fingers to kiss. "My Lord, I have done terrible things. I submit myself to your punishment." He looked up, meeting the Dark Lord's red eyes squarely, and dropped all his occlumentic shields. From his mind and into Voldemort's poured all the information he'd ever possessed- Dumbledore, and Harriet Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. And along with it came Robin, and Kit, and Annie, and every ounce of pain Severus had lived through.

At the end of it, Voldemort's thin lips had drawn back to reveal his pointed teeth. "You have betrayed me time and time again, Severus," he hissed. "You know what your punishment must be. But for this, your final act of obedience, I will be merciful."

"I do not seek clemency, my Lord."

"My clemency is this," Voldemort said, his skeletal fingers drawing his wand. He aimed it deliberately between Severus' pleading eyes. "For your information, and for your pain, I will make it quick.

" _Avada Kedavra_."

* * *

Minerva McGonagall passed beneath the wrought iron gates of the cemetery. She was dressed as a muggle, her wand carefully hidden away under layers and layers of charms and transfigurations. To show her identity would be certain death at the hands of Voldemort, now the malevolent dictator of the magical world after the deaths of Albus and Harry. It was a risk even to come here, but she could not let the date go unnoted.

The newer graves were towards the back of the cemetery. A few rows down from her destination, an interment was occuring, a stark reminder of the events of a year ago. Kneeling beside a stark black marble tombstone, she laid a single flower, a snow-white lily alongside the wreath of red roses that lay there already. "Sleep well, Severus," she whispered. "Sweet dreams, Robin." Carefully, she stood to look down at the carved letters that were all that remained of her friend.

 _Robin Christopher 'Kit' Brandon_

 _(1978-1997)_

 _Son of Severus Tobias Snape_

 _(1959-1997)_

 _Who lies here also_

 _For there is nothing lost, that may be found, if sought_

* * *

Author's note:

Whew, it's been a while since I wrote anything fanfic-y, but this alternative to Robin's history wouldn't leave me alone. I'm fortunate enough to have never had any experience of the care system, so any mistakes in the practicalities are entirely mine!

As with all writers, any thoughts and comments are hugely appreciated!


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